Double Standards

16102010

I’ve said quite a bit about the slut/stud double standard before. Just type “double standard” into the little search box to the right to see for yourself.

I’ve noted that it makes sense biologically. There are multiple reproductive strategies that can be successful for humans (in the pre-historic world in which we developed), but one strategy that is doomed to fail would be for a man to commit to a promiscuous or already pregnant woman, so that is not in our nature. For women, however, committing to (or simply mating with) a promiscuous man may actually be more likely to lead to successful reproduction. The man in the tribe with the most women is probably the strongest and most able provider, and even if he doesn’t provide for all his offspring, the implication of his status is that he has the best genes.

I’ve also mentioned that there is a corollary to the slut/stud double standard, the pure/loser double standard. Men who make it into their twenties without having had sex are simply not attractive to young women. It’s not that they can’t get laid because they aren’t attractive, but that they aren’t attractive because they can’t get laid. When women insult men, as men, they accuse them of being gay, rapists, and virgins (usually not all at once). Male virgins are seen as losers, while female virgins are prized. No man has ever intentionally insulted a woman by calling her a virgins.

One thing I think I haven’t said is that promiscuity in men correlates with high self-esteem while promiscuity in women correlates with low self-esteem, at least according to Dr. Drew Pinsky of Loveline. I’ve tried to find other sources for this on the web, but I’ve only managed to find it in life. As someone who’s listened to that show and dealt with various women for several years, I think I’m pretty good identifying pathological behavior in women and I think promiscuous behavior is almost always pathological in women. It’s like a drug addiction in that it gets worse as it progresses. I wouldn’t say that this is never the case with men, but I don’t think it’s the norm. It seemed a bit silly to me when Tiger Woods was labelled a sex addict. Why? It’s normal for males (in almost all animal species) to seek variety, but is rather pointless in females since they’re incapable of having more than one successful pregnancy at a time.

My motivation for this post comes from Katherine, who asked:

I am confused about your ideas on the double standard. Why is a woman who sleeps around not a good candidate for a long-term relationship, at the same time that a man who sleeps around is not a problem?

A woman who sleeps around is a problem because she’s probably nuts, as I was saying above. I haven’t said that a man who sleeps around isn’t a problem. Maybe it’s less of a problem, but the difference is what is attractive to the opposite sex, and promiscuity in men does not negatively impact their value in the sexual marketplace, as it does for women. Certainly, some women make an effort to avoid players, but this is a relatively trivial matter. I’m writing from and for the male perspective, so it’s not really my thing to offer advice to women, but I would definitely advise them avoid aloof men who can’t be trusted if they want to be in good relationships.

I personally don’t think sleeping around is a good idea for anyone, because it’s empty and kind of upsetting (at least to me). However, I’m not going to hate on anyone who does it – man or woman.

It’s upsetting to you because you’re a woman. I don’t seek meaningless sex (because it’s better when it’s meaningful*), but it doesn’t make me feel bad. The only sex men ever feel bad about is the sex we’re not having.

Why do you think it’s ok for one and not the other?

Ok? I never said anything was or wasn’t ok. Perhaps your confusion is that you conflate the positive with the normative. I don’t think I ever said anything about what is or isn’t ok in some cosmic or moral sense. I’m stating the facts as I understand them to be. Saying that behavior A will result in X for men and Y for women is not the same as saying that behavior A is okay for men and bad for women. That’s all this is.

Roissy aka Chateau recently put things a bit more bluntly in his post about Karen Owen, the infamous Duke slut who made the fuck-list Powerpoint presentation:

Karen Owen has royally fucked up her chances to extract marriage from a good man thanks to her intemperate decision to write about, share and, consequently, archive for the masses for all eternity her insatiable hunger for a variety of lacrosse cock. Try to turn down the knobs on your psychologically-cemented female projection modules for a moment and put yourself in an alpha male’s shoes. What man worth his yarbles in character, money, career, looks, charm and/or social status is going to use Karen Owen for anything more than a hole in which to dump a perfunctory fuck? What high status man would marry a slut with a tap sheet a mile long, her every clitoral flutter registered in loving detail in ASCII, jpeg and png for his friends to read and laugh at?

[…]

The impolite fact is that a man who wrote an Owen-esque fuck list would not suffer much, if any, penalty in the dating market *or* in the more tightly regulated social market for his promiscuity. Sure, a few femtards would wail at the objectifying of women and the unfairness that ugly but SMRT broads are passed over for alpha bimbo sorostitutes, but in the crucible of real life most normal heterosexual women would be uncomfortably drawn to such a man, and would work for his affections. I’m sure the athletes who are a part of Owen’s fuck list are high-fiving their pounding of Owen’s sperm cavern when they’re not fucking a hundred other groupies scrambling for their attentions.

Bottom line: a male Karen Owen would actually see his sexual market value *rise*, while Owen’s value as a girlfriend and potential wife has undoubtedly fallen. This — plus the raw hypergamy on display by her choice of sexual partners and her ability to effortlessly fulfill that limbic impulse — is the underlying message of Owen’s cutesy confessional. And it’s the message that the legacy media, the middle-aged vicars of vicariousness, and the feminists are trying hard to miss.